Lee's Lieutenants

by Douglas Southall Freeman

  In the events of the new year new brigade commanders had a share. Powell Hill had applied for Moxley Sorrel, Longstreet’s A.A.G., to head the brigade of Rans Wright, sent to Georgia. Sorrel took command in November, and on February 7 went down with a chest wound that would incapacitate him for months. Another Georgia brigade, equally famous, also suffered a change. In succession to Wofford, also called to Georgia, was Dudley M. DuBose, former colonel of the 15th Georgia. George H. Steuart, exchanged prisoner of war, took Armistead’s old brigade. Brigadier General J. J. Archer did not long survive his release from prison and resumption of command; Colonel William McComb of the 14th Tennessee was promoted to succeed him. The fragments of Bushrod Johnson’s Tennessee brigade were consolidated with Archer’s men. The brigade of the wounded Stephen Elliot was entrusted to Colonel William H. Wallace of the 18th South Carolina, who was made a brigadier in accordance with the act for temporary appointments. Colonel William H. Forney, 10th Alabama, was promoted and assigned to Sanders’s brigade. James P. Simms, colonel of the 53rd Georgia, was named as successor to the resigned Goode Bryan. To Young M. Moody, colonel of the 43rd Alabama, was entrusted the brigade of Archibald Gracie, killed in the Petersburg trenches on December 3. Colonel W. F. Perry, who had commanded Law’s old brigade for months, was appointed brigadier on March 16. Some of these were last-minute imperative appointments to assure direction of troops when open campaigning began. In more than one instance, perhaps, promotion was not made because the officer was assumed to be competent, but because other aspirants were manifestly, even notoriously unqualified. The springs of command had run dry.

  Colonel Lindsay Walker received on March 1 the commission of brigadier general of artillery, which Long of the Second Corps and Alexander of the First already held. Of the cavalrymen, Colonel R. L. T. Beale of the 9th Virginia was advanced January 13 to the rank of brigadier and assigned formally to the brigade he had been leading ever since the death of John R. Chambliss.

  Three other changes of a character more dramatic were made. Worn by hard service and outraged by unjust criticism, James A. Seddon insisted on resigning as secretary of war. On February 6,1865, John C. Breckinridge succeeded him. Simultaneously, the position of the foremost Southern leader was changed. Because of discontent in the General Assembly of Virginia and in the Congress with the management of the war, the President somewhat reluctantly signed, on January 23, a bill for the appointment of a general-in-chief to command the military forces of the Confederate States. This avowedly was a last effort to utilize the abilities of Lee to the fullest. Had this order been interpreted by the Army of Northern Virginia as notice that Lee would cease to exercise direct control of his old troops, more harm than good would have been done. As it was understood that Lee would remain in command in Virginia and act elsewhere through the generals in the field, the enlargement of the duties of “Marse Robert” was to the men in the trenches little more than a matter of present pride and vague hope.

  The third major change was full of tragedy. Near Waynesboro, on March 2, Jubal Early was attacked again by Sheridan in overwhelming strength. Early’s small command was demoralized and in bad order. He had little more than 1,000 infantry and just 6 guns that could be moved; Tom Rosser collected about 100 cavalry to form a skirmish line. Early tried to make a stand long enough to evacuate his guns and supplies. It was not to be. The small force broke quickly; the enemy got in its rear. With about a score of companions, Early rode over the mountains in an effort to escape, and after much hardship reached Petersburg. He had left with a corps; he came back almost alone.14

  Lee determined to send Jube back to the Valley, which Sheridan had by that time left, in the hope he would be able to collect and reorganize scattered troops. There was no thought, apparently, of restoring Early to the command of the Second Corps on the Petersburg front. Gordon was doing admirably. Lee must have reasoned, also, that Early’s disasters would make him unacceptable to the troops. Failure overtook this considerate effort to keep Early in the service by employing him in the Valley. A desperate people and an embittered press were unwilling to have the defeated general retained in any position of military trust. So great was the clamor that Lee on March 30 had to relieve Early of command and send him home to await orders. To this fate had fallen Old Jube of Manassas and Williamsburg, of Cedar Mountain and Sharpsburg, of Salem Church and the Monocacy.

  2

  THE LAST ATTEMPTS AT GRAND STRATEGY

  The miserable, wintry weeks of desertion and reorganization had witnessed desperate attempts by the Confederates to use the knife of strategy to cut the coils that were enveloping them. After the repulse of Butler’s attack of December 23-26 on Fort Fisher, below Wilmington, the Federals returned to Hampton Roads, refitted, changed commanders, and steamed back. Fire from the fleet heavily damaged Fort Fisher on January 14. The next afternoon the fort with its armament and garrison fell. The defense had been conducted by Braxton Bragg, sent to Wilmington in advance, and by Robert Hoke and Chase Whiting and William Lamb, the immediate commander of the fort. Both Lamb and Whiting were wounded and captured. Whiting was sent to Fort Columbus, Governor’s Island, whence he wrote a furious demand for an investigation of the conduct of Bragg, whom he blamed for the disaster. Whiting did not live to prosecute his charge or to witness the effect on the Southern cause of the loss of the fortifications he had built. Death from his wound ended on March 10 his strange, frustrated career.15

  So desperate had the situation now become that the possibility of peace negotiations was seized upon eagerly. Francis P. Blair, Sr., had came to Richmond January 12; as mysteriously as he arrived, Blair left the city. Millions of Southerners hoped that he carried with him a draft of a peace treaty. It was manifest by the time of Blair’s visit that Sherman would march northward from Savannah into South Carolina. If not resisted successfully there by the small force W.J. Hardee commanded at Charleston, Sherman could advance into North Carolina and into southern Virginia. Were Lee’s army to remain at Petersburg, facing Grant’s troops, Sherman could destroy the last railroads that fed the army, and then he could take Lee in flank or rear.

  Sherman must be stopped. That was imperative. By no possibility could “Lee’s Miserables” contend against Grant and Sherman combined. Conner’s brigade, which had been Kershaw’s famous old command, accordingly was sent to South Carolina at the instance of Governor A. G. Magrath. Pending a decision whether additional infantry could be dispatched from Virginia, more cavalry had to be provided. Hampton believed that his crippled old division under Calbraith Butler could get mounts if it went back to South Carolina to seek them. Lee authorized the move, and regretfully, also, he authorized Hampton to leave the army and visit the Palmetto State and endeavor to stir the people.

  This detachment of Butler on January 19 was the final instance in which the Army of Northern Virginia was weakened to strengthen the Confederate cause elsewhere. The release of one third of the cavalry seemed necessary and appeared to involve no heavier risks than had been taken half a dozen times; but the event was to show—as Lee himself saw afterward—that the departure of Hampton’s division hastened the catastrophe.

  Had it been possible to honor the departing Wade Hampton, he would have deserved the homage of massed regiments, dipping standards, and acclaiming hands. In all the high companionship of knightly men, none had exemplified more of character and courage and none had fewer mistakes charged against him. Untrained in arms and abhorring war, the South Carolina planter had proved himself the peer of any professional soldier commanding within the same bounds and opportunities. He may not have possessed military genius, but he had the nearest approach to it.

  By the end of January, John M. Schofield, with heavy reinforcements, arrived at Wilmington and assumed direction of the Federal Department of North Carolina. Schofield was placed under the orders of Sherman, ominous confirmation of the fear that the stern man who had wasted Georgia would hasten up the Atlantic coast toward the dwindling army in the Petersburg trenche
s and on the bleak and muddy lines below Richmond.

  As a consequence of Francis P. Blair’s visit to the Confederate capital, on February 3 a conference was held in Hampton Roads between President Lincoln and Secretary of State William Seward on one side and, on the other, three Confederate representatives, Vice-President Alexander H. Stephens, Senator R. M. T. Hunter, and former Supreme Court Justice James A. Campbell. At the close of a single meeting the Southerners left and returned to Richmond. On the sixth President Davis announced formally that the Hampton Roads conference had failed because Mr. Lincoln “refused to enter into negotiations … or to permit us to have peace on any other basis than our unconditional submission to their rule….”16

  The disappointment came at a time of crisis in everything. Two days previously, Lee had been compelled to dissipate the last hope of the administration that he could hold his lines and still send substantial assistance to South Carolina. This could not be done, Lee said; Hardee or Beauregard or whoever commanded in the Palmetto State must oppose Sherman with such force as could be mustered there. No peace without surrender, no meat for men battling in wintry weather, no prospect of effective resistance to Sherman—in the face of all this the braver officers and men held together.

  It was learned that Beauregard had resumed command in South Carolina. While he reported himself with fewer men than would constitute a strong brigade, Old Bory was fertile in suggesting what should be done with the troops of other leaders. With the fall of Wilmington, military chaos was threatened in North Carolina, and it was plain that command must be coordinated at once. Lee had to conclude that Beauregard, in the circumstances, was not “able to do much.” Accordingly, in spite of the President’s notorious dislike of Joseph E. Johnston, Lee as general-in-chief had Johnston given the direction of the Department of Tennessee and Georgia and of the Department of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. There was no time for finesse. Beauregard and his forces and Bragg’s troops from Wilmington were directed to report to Johnston.17

  Without hope of peace by negotiation, nothing remained for Lee’s army except to resume the fight in the field, provided the men were willing to face the overmastering odds. By March, two possibilities of breaking the grip of the enemy were considered and, in time, were combined. One was for Johnston to hold off Sherman, beat the Federals if possible, and prevent a junction with Schofield. If Johnston failed in this, he was to move his own forces toward Virginia. The Army of Northern Virginia was to shake itself loose from Grant and march to join Johnston. The two Confederate armies were then to assail Sherman and, having defeated him, were to turn and attack Grant.

  Johnston never had much faith in realization of the scheme because he knew the weakness of his troops, on whom Lee and the administration placed too much reliance, but the commander in North Carolina worked hard and honestly to checkmate his adversary. The enemy, Johnston soon concluded, was too strong and too advantageously placed to be attacked with any prospect of success. If junction was effected between Sherman and Schofield, “their march into Virginia,” said Johnston on March 11, “cannot be prevented by me.”

  Concluding that Johnston’s army could accomplish little, Lee studied a second plan that fitted into the first. Longstreet, Gordon, and Johnston had made the same general suggestion in different forms. It was, in effect, that Lee endeavor to hold Richmond and Petersburg, or Richmond only, with part of his forces and dispatch the rest to join Johnston for an attack on Sherman. Then the victorious army could move northward, relieve Richmond, and deal with Grant on terms less unequal. The main defect of the plan was patent: The Confederate lines on the Richmond-Petersburg front already were so lightly held that if any part of the defenders were detached, Grant could storm almost any sector he chose.18

  Discussion produced at length, through the ingenuity of Gordon, a plan that seemed to overcome this objection. Gordon proposed that at a point he believed vulnerable, he assault the Federal line, break through, take a position in rear, and sweep down the Union works to force Grant to abandon the left of his line. Lee then would have a shorter front and consequently a greater density of force.19 Perhaps it was indicative not only of the desperation but also of the distorted military thought of the Confederates that in planning this they should ignore the certainty of an immediate counterstroke by Grant. They assumed, apparently, that after the Confederates broke through, the Union commander submissively would disregard his own numerical superiority and docilely take up a shorter line. That was not Grant’s way. He would blunder but he always would fight. At the moment he was thinking of Lee’s retreat and the difficulty of overtaking him. Grant would have asked nothing better than that the Confederates assume the offensive.

  In curious disregard of this, Lee authorized Gordon to develop his plan for storming the Federal lines and cutting off the Union left. Approval would depend in part on what happened in North Carolina, and in part on a new and most ominous factor, namely, the probable return of Sheridan’s mounted troops to Grant’s army. There was no reason why Sheridan’s cavalry should remain in the Shenandoah Valley. He had destroyed all its barns and mills and stables; the Valley could supply no more food to the Confederate army. If Sheridan returned while Calbraith Butler’s division was in Carolina to oppose the advancing Sherman and Schofield, the Confederate troopers of Fitz Lee and Rooney Lee would face odds that would be long and might be hopeless.

  Events moved swiftly. On the night of March 23, after Gordon had explained to Lee what he intended to do, he was told to assemble his forces and make the assault on the morning of the twenty-fifth. The plan he had developed was to deliver a surprise attack before dawn at a point, Fort Stedman, where the opposing trenches were not more than 150 yards apart. Men in three carefully chosen columns of 100 were to press through the enemy line, then make a rush for small forts behind the heavy main defenses. While fire from these forts was poured into the rear of the Federals, strong forces would rush through the break and advance up and down the trenches. Cavalry would push to the rear and destroy the enemy’s lines of communication. Almost half the Confederate infantry on the Southside were to be thrown into the assault. On the twenty-fourth it was decided to bring Pickett’s division from the Northside and use it also, if it could arrive in time. While the attack was being delivered, Longstreet was to demonstrate below Richmond.

  All the preparations were made smoothly and with maximum secrecy. In the pre-dawn darkness, March 25, Gordon ordered the signal given. The Confederate pickets, who had crept forward, sprang silently upon the opposing pickets. Experienced axemen, with swift blows, hacked to pieces the sharpened timbers that protected the Union works. Behind them poured the three columns of 100, each man with a white band on his arm. After these troops surged the main body of the infantry.

  Surprise scarcely could have been more nearly complete. Passageways were cut through the heavy obstructions. Everything worked to perfection. Gordon went with the troops into Fort Stedman, where he saw his men spread to left and right and observed a large number of sleepy, bewildered prisoners. It looked as if success would attend the operation on which hung the life of the Confederacy! Picked officers and men of Strib-ling’s battalion of artillery turned the four guns of Fort Stedman on the enemy. Ordnance in an adjoining battery also was brought into service against the Federals. Never had fortune smiled more approvingly on John B. Gordon. What he wanted to hear now was the crash of guns from the small forts in the rear, the forts to which he had told those columns of 100 to press. If the guns in those earthworks would bring their fire to bear on the Union rear, the victory would be complete.20

  Presently came couriers from the advance columns reporting that they could not find the forts they were seeking. There followed long, long minutes of uncertainty, confusion, and suspense. Then, gradually, a fine initial success became a reversed Battle of the Crater. Before they realized it, the Confederates were confined to Fort Stedman and a narrow front of trenches from which they could not advance. There was no prospect of
reinforcements; Gordon had been warned that the arrival of Pickett was improbable. Grimly, at dawn, Gordon had to notify Lee that the rear forts had not been reached and that the advance had been halted.

  Tenure of Stedman and the near-by captured line soon became intolerable. As it became light all the Federal batteries on a long stretch of line were hurling their projectiles into the fort and the adjacent work. In these works, open to the rear, Gordon’s men were exposed helplessly. The Southern commander could see also, as morning light spread, that the enemy was massing troops in a cordon around Fort Stedman. An attack evidently would be made in a short time, and this could not be prevented by anything Gordon could do. John Gordon had learned the rewards of tenacity, and doubtless he would have died manfully, if the cause demanded the sacrifice, at the farthest traverse his troops had reached. That was not required of him. About 8:00 A.M. orders came from General Lee to evacuate the captured works.